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Big development, little community
Posted: Wednesday, Sep 03, 2008 - 01:18:11 pm EDT
By Nathan Blackford - Warrick Publishing Online
The idea is part education, part entertainment. It would have a nonprofit anchor, surrounded by commercial development. It is intended to bring in tourists from places like Indianapolis, Nashville, St. Louis and Cincinnati. And it could open its doors in about five years.
The nonprofit Hoosier Heritage Youth Foundation wants to build a new indoor-outdoor museum just south of Elberfeld, in rural Warrick County. Known as Village Earth, it would have animatronics and live animals to create a visual display of the history of land use in the midwestern United States.
The project could also involve an aquatic center, a wind farm, an aquarium, several restaurants, hotels, conference centers, a movie theater and more.
“It would be a regional entertainment destination in the midwest,” said Jeffrey M. Phillips, the Hoosier Heritage Youth Foundation executive vice president. “This is a significant land opportunity that does not exist anywhere else. It will be a depiction of the Midwestern ecosystem brought to life through world known exhibit designers.”
Phillips lives in Indianapolis, and is a former resident of Boonville. He says his family — including his father, a former state legislator — has always been interested in land conservation.
Village Earth would be located just outside the Bluegrass Fish and Wildlife Area. It would also be located close to both Interstate 64 and the Interstate 69 corridor.
Warrick County Economic Development Director Larry Taylor is a supporter of the idea. It would, he believes, create new jobs as well as bring tourists to the area.
“You’ve already got people coming to this area, because Holiday World is getting bigger and bigger,” said Taylor. “And people are coming there as a destination, so they may come here to an educational museum for a day and then go to Holiday World for a couple of days. They can make a whole vacation of it.”
The Hoosier Heritage Youth Foundation already sponsors educational, conservation-centered programs for local schools. There are two 90-minute sessions, one targeted for elementary school students and the other for high schoolers.
Village Earth would be an opportunity to bring to life those same educational goals and objectives, said Phillips. It would also create an opportunity to tie in higher education for forestry, environmental sciences, natural resources, wildlife management, renewable energy resources and more.
“We want to create an experiential learning center that would provide not only jobs and economic development,” said Phillips, “but would also be a way to finance the foundation’s interpretive center as well as perpetuation of the foundation forever.”
“It’s an attraction that’s an educational, conservation type of thing,” said Taylor. “But it is also a working attraction. It could have a wind farm and other environmental types of labs. The idea is that it is an attraction for school kids as well as anyone who comes to this area.”
The entire project would need about $157 million in bonds, with $113 million used to create the interpretive center. The rest of the money would pay for infrastructure improvements for both the nonprofit and commercial development. With the private investments, the entire development will be worth about $300 million.
To finance the project, the Hoosier Heritage Youth Foundation wants to create a Sales Tax Increment Financing District (STIF). If the state legislature approves such a district, it would allow any new sales taxes from for-profit businesses in the area to be used to repay the bonds.
“From a legislature standpoint, that is a big deal because sales taxes normally go to the state,” said Taylor. “So this is not something that we are financing with property taxes or using other funds. The commercial development would have retail space, hotels, restaurants and that type of thing.”
“The legislation is really very simple,” said Phillips. “It would take all the sales tax revenue generated on the for-profit side, and capture 80 percent of that money. These are not existing revenues, because where this is located, right now there is nothing there. So the legislation would allow for the development to occur.”
The state legislature could approve the STIF District in 2009. If that happens, the Warrick County Commissioners, Redevelopment Commission and County Council would all have to sign off on the plan.
“I’d be hopeful that the legislature will see the opportunities this would provide,” said Phillips. “Right now, we’re talking to developers, we’re talking to retail folks, we are talking to hotel folks. There are a lot of people who are very interested but they can’t get involved without this legislation, because it is just not feasible otherwise.”
For the STIF District to work, the nonprofit Village Earth would have to be built at the same time as the commercial sites. The entire development could open as early as summer of 2012.
In 2004, a group called Entertainment Destination of Indiana proposed a similar project in nearly the same location. That plan was to be centered around a $60 million aquarium, but was never built. The group’s president, Teresa Thuerbach, was later investigated for fraud in connection with a failed raffle.
The new project, said Phillips, isn’t connected in any way with the EDI plan. In fact, he didn’t know such a project had previously been proposed.
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